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4 Million is not much.
In that case you may be best served to copy your character to the Tribble server buy the best gear possible for what you are trying to do, and if that doesn't work out, scrap it, recopy the toon and start over.
respec should be the last thing you do before committing to a build.
I flew weeks with my torpedo armitage before I was comfortable enough with it to put all my weight into torpedos and related skills.

Is the MK X borg engine as fast in sector space as the mk xi or xii? Or at least as fast as the old one? I could see myself actually getting the marks and spending the dil for that, if the above are true.

One's going to be a tactical carrier, which probably means 7-8 weapon slots and a Cmdr Tactical boff station. Add 2 hanger slots, consoles to buff group and fighter damage... Its going to be the highest dps ships in the game. That is, if you can turn the ship.

My engineer's eyeing the Adak'Ukan doff. +300% Threat Generation with AP Delta is going to be so uber.

__________________
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler." -- Albert Einstein

Every race/faction should have a starting world/base with some exclusive tutorial content and then it's out into a sandbox galaxy with faction neutral missions.

Access to certain systems would then be restricted for certain species and ships unless they have advanced in diplomacy enough.

That's basically how it is now

And honestly, I don't really mind. That's pretty much how Trek has always worked. TOS was Feds vs Klinks vs Rommies vs Random Aliens. TNG added Klinks to the Fed side...except when they weren't. Also added a few new enemies: the Cardies, Ferengi, Borg, etc. DS9 was the same way. Voyager was everyone vs. Voyager. ENT was Earth + Vulcans vs All, until the end (and even sometimes Earth and Vulcan fought!). The only real difference between STO and TV Trek is that in TV Trek diplomacy was an option, and the preferred one at that.

Both the power creep and the ongoing watering down of the factions is not doing anything for my excitement.

At this point having real factions doesn't even make sense anymore.

Every race/faction should have a starting world/base with some exclusive tutorial content and then it's out into a sandbox galaxy with faction neutral missions.

Access to certain systems would then be restricted for certain species and ships unless they have advanced in diplomacy enough.

Honestly, what you want was only done by the first generation of MMOs such as UO, EQ1, AO, DAoC back in the 1990s. Very few subsequent MMOs have even dared to do this unless they had a massive budget. Quite simply, it does not make financial sense to create content that only half your players cannot see.

So unless you can give Cryptic $10 million and a year to make new STO zones, what you are asking for is quite impossible.

__________________
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler." -- Albert Einstein

Both the power creep and the ongoing watering down of the factions is not doing anything for my excitement.

At this point having real factions doesn't even make sense anymore.

Every race/faction should have a starting world/base with some exclusive tutorial content and then it's out into a sandbox galaxy with faction neutral missions.

Access to certain systems would then be restricted for certain species and ships unless they have advanced in diplomacy enough.

Honestly, what you want was only done by the first generation of MMOs such as UO, EQ1, AO, DAoC back in the 1990s. Very few subsequent MMOs have even dared to do this unless they had a massive budget. Quite simply, it does not make financial sense to create content that only half your players cannot see.

So unless you can give Cryptic $10 million and a year to make new STO zones, what you are asking for is quite impossible.

Actually, not really in that none of those first generation MMOs had tutorials per se (some did add actual tutorials later in their lifecycle) - and with those, the reason you stayed in the 'newbie area' until you reached a certain level, was because if you ventured into a higher level area, a MOB near the zone in point would insta-kill you. And those games had tangible death penalties like loss of XP (usually a few hours worth), so you REALLY wanted to avoid death.

If you want to know what changed the MMO market to the WAY more casual-friendly/non-restrictive model; it was the fact that:

- Blizzard did a study that showed lees then 10% of their playerbase ever made use of end game raid content (imncluding the content that required players to unlock access to said Raid areas); and further less then 2% fully completed/finished the Raid content fully.

So, they started catering more to the 90%; and saw a boost in subs and retention; and other MMO developers, seeing this trend, followed suit.

That's why now, in any MMO, not only is there a 'hold my hand' tutorial, less locked content, no real death penalty - and of the 'locked Raid' content; the stuff needed to unlock access and progress through it is WAY lower. The few attempts made to 'bring back' the old 'EQ' style game (one notable one was Vanguard: Saga of Heroes) have ultimately (and V:SoH just did as well) either failed hard; or retooled content to current MMO market trends. (Even 'EvE Online' has taken steps to make elements of their game 'less harsh' - and it honestly remains one of the few 'old school'/'hardcore' MMOs (although it's really PvP based with little PvE at all) still around.)

Yeah, that suggestion was not entirely serious.
But at this point it really feels like they smashed the assets of a game like that into another type of game and hope nobody notices.

I read the stats of the new ships. Still not impressed.
They won't be a game changer by themselves, but get a high synergy effect from using DOminion gear and support from other Dominion ships.
I wouldn't want to go up against a premade including 2-3 bug ships, 1-2 escort carriers and a carrier dread captain with bug ship wings.

Actually, not really in that none of those first generation MMOs had tutorials per se (some did add actual tutorials later in their lifecycle) - and with those, the reason you stayed in the 'newbie area' until you reached a certain level, was because if you ventured into a higher level area, a MOB near the zone in point would insta-kill you. And those games had tangible death penalties like loss of XP (usually a few hours worth), so you REALLY wanted to avoid death.

If you want to know what changed the MMO market to the WAY more casual-friendly/non-restrictive model; it was the fact that:

- Blizzard did a study that showed lees then 10% of their playerbase ever made use of end game raid content (imncluding the content that required players to unlock access to said Raid areas); and further less then 2% fully completed/finished the Raid content fully.

So, they started catering more to the 90%; and saw a boost in subs and retention; and other MMO developers, seeing this trend, followed suit.

That's why now, in any MMO, not only is there a 'hold my hand' tutorial, less locked content, no real death penalty - and of the 'locked Raid' content; the stuff needed to unlock access and progress through it is WAY lower. The few attempts made to 'bring back' the old 'EQ' style game (one notable one was Vanguard: Saga of Heroes) have ultimately (and V:SoH just did as well) either failed hard; or retooled content to current MMO market trends. (Even 'EvE Online' has taken steps to make elements of their game 'less harsh' - and it honestly remains one of the few 'old school'/'hardcore' MMOs (although it's really PvP based with little PvE at all) still around.)

V:SoH isn't a good example. I was a play-tester since its 3rd alpha stage all the way till launch day about 3 years later. I knew most of the devs and spoke to them regularly while they were developing the game. V:SoH failed not because of locked content or any design issues. It failed due to Brad McQuaid being a heavy pot user and half the senior management team quitting in disgust, leaving only junior devs with little experience running the show. The game launched with unbalanced spells, powers, and there really was only one area that I felt was up-to-par and fun to play.

__________________
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler." -- Albert Einstein

Both the power creep and the ongoing watering down of the factions is not doing anything for my excitement.

At this point having real factions doesn't even make sense anymore.

Every race/faction should have a starting world/base with some exclusive tutorial content and then it's out into a sandbox galaxy with faction neutral missions.

Access to certain systems would then be restricted for certain species and ships unless they have advanced in diplomacy enough.

Honestly, what you want was only done by the first generation of MMOs such as UO, EQ1, AO, DAoC back in the 1990s. Very few subsequent MMOs have even dared to do this unless they had a massive budget. Quite simply, it does not make financial sense to create content that only half your players cannot see.

So unless you can give Cryptic $10 million and a year to make new STO zones, what you are asking for is quite impossible.

In terms of sandbox MMO's, Black Desert doesn't look too bad, though it is fantasy based:

"Black Desert is a large scale sandbox MMORPG that provides you with a variety of unique experiences with spectacular action and battle, strategy-oriented castle siege, sophisticated simulation contents such as trade, NPC-hiring and real-estate management."

"Combat has been described as a hybrid between third-person action titles like TERA and Vindictus, and FPS-style systems like those in the Elder Scrolls series."

Master Keys haven't shot up in price like they have in the past. Unfortunate for me - I spent all my EC on my main to get keys early to sell at a gain I guess between the low dil:zen price and the key sale, people aren't wholly depending on the Exchange for keys.

Also, it seems the boxes drop less. Probably not true, but maybe. I did two combat missions and a couple STF's, and only got one box. Heck, I've only gotten 20-30 boxes total in the last month, when I used to be able to do that in less than a week.